


surely he hath born our griefs and carried our sorrows, or; we did not expect you to leave us

by hallawrites



Category: Christian Bible (New Testament), Christian Bible (Old Testament), תהילים | Psalms
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Author Is Sleep Deprived, Biblical Imagery (Abrahamic Religions), Biblical Reinterpretation, Biblical Scripture References (Abrahamic Religions), Biblical Themes (Abrahamic Religions), Blood and Violence, Book of Isaiah reference, Book of Psalms reference, Canonical Character Death, Choking, Crucifixion, F/M, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, M/M but it's extremely complicated/platonic, POV First Person, POV Unknown, Pesach | Passover, Podfic Welcome, The Author Regrets Nothing, The Romans, also who??? exactly??? is writing this thing???, anyway imma keep quiet before these tags start turning into a dissertation, but I will try, but even i can't track down how many different things are in here, do not ask me, i do not know, i would have added little footnotes, john the beloved!, judas (in passing)!, mary!, nathanael and his fig tree and the sound of God bubbling up behind his teeth, please do not ask me what i was thinking when i wrote this, send help, simon and the way that he chokes because he remembers what he said to yeshua before losing him, squint and you'll see something else, the use of rabbi as an endearment, there are so many damn references in this piece that i possibly cannot name them all, there is angst, what is a man? a miserable pile of secrets, y e s h u a, y'all. y'ALL
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-06
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-15 11:20:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28562670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hallawrites/pseuds/hallawrites
Summary: ( do not ask me to cry You a crucifixion. i cannot hear You scream again. )
Relationships: Elohim | God | Allah/Jesus Christ (Christian Bible), Jesus Christ & Judas Iscariot, Jesus Christ & Mary Mother of Jesus | Maryam bint Imran, Jesus Christ/John the Apostle, Jesus Christ/John the Beloved/Mary Magdalene, Jesus Christ/Mary Magdalene, Jesus Christ/Simon Peter
Comments: 4
Kudos: 7
Collections: a lie strong and settled





	surely he hath born our griefs and carried our sorrows, or; we did not expect you to leave us

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Daegaer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daegaer/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Lamentation of Mary Magdalene (from the Aramaic: they have taken away my lord)](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/738168) by S.T. Gibson. 
  * Inspired by [Lamentation of John (alternately titled Some Manuscripts Read: The Prophet does Not Come)](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/738417) by S.T. Gibson. 
  * Inspired by [mary magdalene, at the tomb](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/737409) by notbecauseofvictories. 



_rabbi,_  


( i do not know how to begin this.

i do not know how not to weep while i think of You, corpse-cold and cross heavy, but i will try. forgive me. )

  
  
we are not doing so well without You here. mary opens her mouth to give a blessing and instead Gethsemane

surges up from the back of her throat, all torchlight and cord, all judas' kiss and alabaster. wine

is not just wine, it is Your blood leaking from every opening, bread is not just bread, it is Your

body pierced through and treated like a wound--when we close our eyes to dream we hear You,

again, _elahi elahi lama sabachthani_ , why have you forsaken me, why have you left me like this, why

have you leeched the marrow from out of my bones and given me this sorrow instead.

  
( this is what i am trying to tell You.

do not ask me to cry You a crucifixion. i cannot hear You scream again. )

_rabbi,_

i am starting to think that we cannot go on without You now. john has not smiled since that day, speaks

to no one but Your mother, grief-hearted and sick with the loss of messiah--if i am to

speak the truth i must say that i have heard him, sometimes, in the quiet. he

does not want to be a son, but he will do it anyway because of You. because he loves You,

does not want to believe that You have loved him, that You have left him, all weeping without a goodbye.

( this is what i am trying to tell myself.

do not ask me to bite my tongue and sing Your Father's praises when You are buried in a tomb that is not

Your own. i cannot say that You deserved to die. )

( _barukh_

_atah Adonai Eloheinu_

_melekh ha'olam,_

_dayan ha-emet._ )

_rabbi,_

there is a wrongness about the fact that i am starting to forget the sound of Your laughter simply

because it has been leeched out of me, poured out like water, stripped like Your skin raw

after a flogging. peter has taken to keeping his tongue inside his mouth

strength dried up like a potsherd and swallowed like a sinkhole and every time he opens it he chokes, because

 _you will disown Me this night_ is caught in his lungs and when he coughs it is _i do not know the man_ and

the echo of a rooster afterwards--You have let him have this kindness. let him tell all of Your bones as he

guards what is left of the Man he has followed for so long, all shrouded in pity, all of the skin still the same.

( this is what i have not told the others.

do not ask me to believe that when they nailed You to the cross they did not know what they were doing.

i cannot fathom the thought of roman soldiers laying You out like a cut of meat and being innocent

with knifes still in their hands. )

_rabbi,_

let me inform You that i am about to speak a revelation. do not disown me for it. nathanael

sits under the fig tree in the yard by the gate, treating his lips like they are burnt coal from the altar of

his G-d and a prophecy inhabits the hollows of his teeth cutting into him like solitude. he is looking

for You in the shadows of a setting sun, every inhale _i saw you,_ _i saw you,_ _i have seen you,_ _i will continue to see_

and i am trying to get him to eat but he says that until You claw Yourself back into life it is not finished, it

will never be finished, _tell me how to get him_ _to eat because i_ _do not want him dead like You_ \--i ask him to drink

and he says that he has drank enough salt in his life. the water from Cana has turned into wine and that

has turned into blood, and he takes it all like a drowning.

( this is what i know. i am trying to remind myself of that fact.

do not ask me to say the shema and swallow the scream in my throat that says this is what they killed

You for, that grinds Golgatha into the caverns of my mouth and pretends that it is holy. i cannot lie to

You. i cannot quench Your thirst. there is no more holiness left. )

_rabbi,_

( i do not want You to forsake us.

i do not want You to leave us to carve our grief out of ourselves and think of the kingdom that You had

promised all crumbling at our feet, all abandoned into a type of brokenness. )

we have not entered the city since we took You down, all Your limbs made into fragility, unsanctified.

joseph and nicodemus have touched You first, lankiness olive-skinned with oblations and

the remembrance that this is not a city we will ever go back to if You do not return as well, up out of Sheol

all blessed and hollowed out by light.

( _yeshua._ here is what i think You have been trying to make me understand. i do not think i can.

do not ask me to embrace the thought of Your absence when all along we have been

waiting for the unveiling of Your presence. i cannot take You at Your word for this. i am not too tired

for unbelief. )

_— also entitled: this is not a gospel worth the telling_

**Author's Note:**

> many thanks to [elisabethdarling](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elisabethdarling/pseuds/elisabethdarling) and her fic ["Garden Eyed Girl"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13190589) for the phrase "sick with messiah;" here, it appears as a variation, i.e. "sick with the loss of messiah," but the two are so similar (and i found her fic right after completing this one) that i think it would be best to give credit where credit is due.
> 
> cross posted on my [tumblr.](https://the-ichor-of-ruination.tumblr.com/post/639525504950599680/also-entitled-this-is-not-a-gospel-worth-the)


End file.
